Keeping water in the wadis of Arabia's perfume capital

Thanks to its summer monsoons, Salalah in southern Oman is a tropical paradise in the Arabian desert. The frankincense trees lining Salalah's glittering wadis have led to it being known as ‘the perfume capital of Arabia’. However, those same wadis frequently flood large areas of the city during cyclonic storms, the last major event in 2004 causing over US$ 50 million of damage. This paper reports on three major projects worth US$ 255 million that are being undertaken to solve the problem once and for all – and with minimal environmental and social impact. They involve constructing a 6 km long earth interceptor dam north of the city, an extensive programme of wadi improvement works and provision of a modern urban drainage system linked to the upgraded wadi network.